Women's Conference 2011

Last week I got the treat of a lifetime! I was able to fly to Utah to attend Women's Conference at BYU along with 3 of my best friends from my childhood. I left early on Wednesday morning and was able to stay until Sunday!! 5 glorious days that were absolutely amazing. I didn't have any meals to make, no laundry to do, AND, no snot or poop or throw-up!!! It really was amazing. I was just a bit excited and did the totally cheesy tourist take-pictures-of-yourself thing at the airport - I was a bit early and there wasn't anybody else around though!

I had to take this picture especially for my sister Mary Lou --- I know how much she loves it when the French language is completely butchered! I really did laugh out loud when I saw this sign at the airport in Kalispell, and so did quite a few of other customers too!

I arrived safe and sound at the Salt Lake City airport and my good friend Jennie picked me up with her adorable girls in the back of her van. We waited for just a short while until another awesome friend flew in - Steph. We totally didn't organize our flights at all, but we flew in within an hour of each other! We all headed to visit Steph's sister for a bit and met up with one more of the awesomest friends ever - Sue. She had driven from Las Vegas and met us at Steph's sister's place. We headed over to the Cougareat at BYU and were able to meet up with a few other friends from Canada. Jennie had baked a cupcake for me -- yes, only one cupcake -- she saved the rest of the cake for later! Jen had also gotten a helium balloon and they sang Happy Birthday to ME since it was my birthday the next day.

Here are the four of us headed out on Thursday morning to begin our adventure at Women's Conference.

We skipped out of one of the afternoon talks so that we could eat CAKE!! Honestly - this was probably one of the funnest birthdays I have had since I was a kid and invited ALL the kids in my class over for a party. The fun part about that was that my sister Melissa invited all the kids over in her class too, and since we share the same birthday --- it was one huge birthday bash!!
Matt and the kids phoned me that morning and sang to me over the phone. It is tradition in our home to call whoever has a birthday and sing to them and my kids are particularly enthusiastic about their singing. I loved that I could hold my phone totally away from my ear and everybody could hear them singing to me!!

Jennie made a skor cake that was absolutely DIVINE!! I think Jen even had it for breakfast the next day. My husband could not believe that the four of us at the WHOLE thing. My only defense was that it took us two days to do it. It sure was good though!

Yup, it's true - I am 35!

Thursday night was SOOOOO much fun!! As part of the Conference there was a concert that we were able to attend. The doors didn't open until 7:30, but since I have such cool friends, we were seated at 7:15 right up near the front! Sue has the best connections and we had so much fun skipping all the lines and getting complimentary passes to the whole conference!! Thanks Sue!! We had some random lady take our picture, and it isn't the best quality, but there were about 20,000 screaming, crazy, bench-jumping women surrounding us!! I have never seen an auditorium fill up quite so fast as it did that night. Who could blame them though with performances from Hilary Weeks, David Osmond, Jennie Oaks Baker, and Vocal Point and more. It was an awesome concert!!

This is the final session on Friday afternoon. Elder Bednar spoke and it was such an awesome experience hearing the LOUD hum of women chattering and the instant SILENCE and REVERENCE that came as soon as Elder Bednar entered. He and his wife both gave wonderful talks. All the classes I attended at the conference were awesome actually. I was able to sit and write notes and actually feel like I really got something out of it. I came home feeling so empowered and capable of taking on anything that life threw at me.

I feel so very blessed to have such amazing women as my friends. I am so grateful that we were able to all get together and experience this together. It was no small task to get us all there at the same time. Between the four of us we have 18 children!! We all have amazing husbands that were there to pick up the slack and make it possible for us to have this special time together.

I am so so so very grateful for my husband Matt. He did an awesome job of being the Dad. When I came home I asked my kids what I missed and they told me all about the awesome food they had while I was gone! Chicken nuggets, mini pizzas, pizza pops....... all the stuff I don't usually let them have, but are a great help for when I'm not around. Matt did make them breakfast almost every morning. It was such a heartwarming moment to drive up to my home and see my children running out the door to meet me. I missed them so much!!

As much as I missed them while I was gone, but I knew that what I was doing was benefiting me in a way that would benefit them as well. I really learned a lot from all the classes I took and I filled my emotional and spiritual gas tank to more than overflowing. It is great to have something to draw upon when the going gets a little tough. One of the things that left a strong impression on me was that I have a CHOICE. I can choose to do hard things, I can choose to make good decisions, I can choose to be better. My new favorite word is RESOLVE. One of the last thoughts I wrote down in my notebook was: I WILL RESOLVE TO MAKE GOOD CHOICES. This was such an amazing experience for me and I would do it again in a heartbeat -- especially when I have such awesome friends by my side!